My Wife Was So Exhausted
With The Long March, Rendered Doubly Fatiguing By The Dew That Had Added
Additional Weight To Her Clothes, That She Could Hardly Ascend The Hill
We Had Just Commenced.
For the last hour our guide had declared that
Foweera was close to us; but experienced in natives' descriptions of
distance, we were quite uncertain as to the hour at which we should
arrive.
We were already at the top of the hill, and within about two
hundred yards of the dense clump of trees my wife was obliged to confess
that she could go no farther. Just at that moment a cock crowed; another
replied immediately from the clump of trees close to us, and the guide,
little appreciating the blessing of his announcement, told us that we
had arrived at Kalloe's village, for which we were bound.
It was nearly 5 A.M., and we had marched from Deang at 9 P.M. There was
some caution required in approaching the village, as, should one of the
Turks' sentries be on guard, he would in all probability fire at the
first object he might see, without a challenge. I therefore ordered my
men to shout, while I gave my well-known whistle that would be a signal
of our arrival. For some time we exerted our lungs in this manner before
we received a reply, and I began to fear that our people were not at
this village: at length a well-known voice replied in Arabic.
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